The National Democratic Congress (NDC’s) Parliamentary Candidate for the Effutu constituency, James Kofi Annan, has indicated that due to the high unemployment and poverty rates, human trafficking has increased in the Effutu constituency.
He emphasized that Effutu is one of the communities with the most prevalent human trafficking issues. He argued that even though various governments have made progress over the years to curb the situation, human trafficking is still a problem that needs to be properly tackled.
The Parliamentary Candidate noted that creating avenues for employment that will ensure that the youth have a source of income and are self-reliant will eradicate poverty and hence put an end to or at least, reduce the rate of human trafficking in the Effutu communities.
Furthermore, Mr. James Kofi Annan alleged that the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) has been on a mission to get voters from other constituencies to register in the Effutu constituency to swing the outcome of the impending elections in favor of the NPP.
“Their (the NPP’s) recruitment used to be NPP people but now they are influencing NDC people to do the same to vote for the NPP in the Effutu Constituency. We have evidence of several people who will say I voted for A or B because I was given something to vote”.
James Kofi Annan
He admonished that the influence of resources should not be undermined as the quest to survive sometimes pushes people to do unthinkable things like accepting money in exchange for a vote during elections.
Moreover, he noted that when people are moved from one constituency to another with financial inducement, there is a purpose that needs to be fulfilled and that purpose is clearly for these imported voters to vote for the party sponsoring their move from other constituencies.
Mr. James Kofi Annan emphasized that this situation occurred during the 2020 General Elections and the just-ended Assembly Elections in the Gomoa East. He stated that interviews conducted during the election in Gomoa East revealed that voters were transported from Gomoa East to vote in the Effutu Constituency.
He alleged that the voter register of the Effutu Constituency is bloated by at least 20,000 voters who are not Effutu constituents, while he beseeched institutions like the Security Services, the Media, and the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) to investigate his allegations against the NPP.
Dumsor Not New To Ghana
Remarking on the erratic power disruption situation nationwide, Mr. Annan argued that Dumsor is not a new phenomenon in Ghana, indicating that the country has been facing power challenges since 19998-99 and to some extent in the Kuffour administration and finally the Mahama Administration before the current NPP administration.
However, he argued that the difference between the situation in the other administrations and the incumbent administration is the insensitivity with which the government and the Ministry of Energy are handling the issue.
“During Rawlings’s time, there was a timetable; we didn’t call it Dumsor. Kuffour’s time there was a timetable; we didn’t call it Dumsor. JM’s time there was a timetable, it was that time the word Dumsor was coined and that is why it was more pronounced and we made political capital out of it. Dumsor timetable enables you and me to plan”.
James Kofi Annan
He further noted that he is appalled by the government’s refusal to produce a load-shedding timetable to guide the public. He stated that the government’s refusal to admit the resurfacing of Dumsor is due to its fear that the situation will be politicized as the government had when it was in opposition.
He indicated that the country’s energy sector is riddled with debts that are self-inflicted, noting that many challenges the sector is embroiled in borders on the incompetency of its leaders.
Conclusively, he argued that the recent resignation of the Board Chairman of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) is a result of the instability that the energy sector is experiencing, indicating that the new replacement of the former Board Chairman will do nothing to improve the operations of the ECG.
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